The Photos Of Hannah Storm After She Suffered First Degree Burns Are Jarring

On New Year’s Day, ESPN’s Hannah Storm returned to work the Rose Parade telecast just three weeks after suffering first and second degree burns in a terrifying-sounding propane grill accident. Storm, who was preparing dinner for her family outside her Connecticut home on the evening of the accident, noticed the flame on her grill had gone out. She turned off the gas, but when she reignited it, it exploded and “a wall of flame came at [her].”

Storm suffered first and second degree burns, and she lost her eyebrows, eyelashes, and some of the hair on her head. She spoke with ABC News about the incident, and shared some of the photos taken of her at the Trauma and Burn Center at Westchester Medical Center. Those photos are tough to look at.

Getting back on TV so soon after the accident must have been tough — self-consciousness about her appearance aside (unfounded self-consciousness: she looked great), there were logistical issues, like the painful process of turning the pages of her script on the day of the telecast. But Storm did it: She sat in a makeup artist’s chair, got some eyebrows brushed on her (“I wanted to kiss [the makeup artist], it looked so good,”) and hosted the Rose Parade. That took guts.